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Copyright © 2001 Eastern Ontario Farmers Forum Inc. All Rights Reserved |
PERTH — Robert Campbell farms the 7
th Concession just north of Perth and owes much of his destiny to the fighting Scottish spirit of his forefathers.The seven-kilometre stretch of road was first farmed by eight Campbells after the War of 1812. For their loyal service to the king, every soldier was granted 100 acres of land, if they first cleared five.
Growing up on that land, Campbell, 46, had his future figured out early. He always knew he was going to farm and has produced milk and eggs all his life. He began dating his wife Janet in Grade Four. A reflection of the times, he is now the last of the Campbells to farm the concession. His son, Drew, 20, will be the 8
th generation to farm the now 313 acres (150 tillable) after he graduates from the University of Guelph. Campbells’ two teenage daughters are too young to see the road ahead.But Drew can see his and it doesn’t include the day-to-day chore of milking. In contrast, to the tide of farm expansions across the province, the Campbells are downsizing.
They sold the dairy herd two months ago. The hired hand left a few weeks later. Campbell sold the last of his heifers in mid-September. "That bothered me as much as anything," Campbell lamented, "because they’re the future."
The dairy barn where they milked 25 to 30 head is on the south side of the concession. There are 13,000 hens, with room for 6,000 more on the north side. "We’re investing on this side of the road," he said, standing in front of the high-rise hen house. It was a simple business decision, with all the emotional agony of letting go of the cows and some of the camaraderie and affection that dairy families share among themselves.
"My son wants to farm. He doesn’t want to milk. It’s a hard job. You have to want to milk cows. If you don’t want to there’s no point in fooling yourself," he said, adding, "and there’s been some health problems."
With cows "the day’s never over." In feathers, the biggest concern are power outages and temperature control, he said. If something goes wrong a monitoring system alerts an alarm company and they begin calling one of five phone numbers, including a neighbour’s, until someone answers.
About eight per cent of sales are to stores and restaurants and from the farmgate. The lion’s share supplies Burnbrae Farms, near Brockville.
While there are about 5,200 dairy farms in the province, there are only about 400 egg producers. The average flock is about 21,000, while some flocks are over 300,000, he said. Compare that, however, to the largest U.S. farms, with 10 million birds each.
"We’re a small family farm and we’re happy to keep it at that size and be viable," Campbell said. "As you get larger the problems mount up."
As for the future, "we’ll see how things look after not seeing the milk cheque come in."